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g>oet  lore  Brochures 

THE    RETREAT    OF    A 
POET  NATURALIST 

Clara  Barrus,  M.D. 


JOHN   BURROUGHS   AT   SLABSIDES 


Qtjrocfjures 


THE  RETREAT  OF  A 
POET  NATURALIST 

By 

CLARA  BARRUS,  M.D. 


BOSTON 

THE  POET  LORE  COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 

1905 


Copyright,  1904,  by  CLARA  BARRUS. 


All  rights  reserved 


PRINTED    AT 

THE  GORHAM  PRESS 

BOSTON,  U.  S.   A. 


A8- 

THE  RETREAT  OF  A  POET 
NATURALIST 

WE  are  all  coming  more  and  more  to 
like  the  savor  of  the  wild  and  the 
unconventional.    Perhaps  it  is  just 
this  savor  or  suggestion  of  free 
fields  and  woods,  both  in  his  life 
and  in  his  books,  that  causes  so  many  persons 
to  seek  out  John  Burroughs  in  his  retreat 
among  the  trees  and  rocks  on  the  hills  that 
skirt  the  western  bank  of  the  Hudson.     To 
Mr.   Burroughs  more  perhaps  than  to  any 
other  living  American  might  be  applied  these 
words  in  Genesis :    "  See,  the  smell  of  my  son 
is  as  the  smell  of  a  field  which  the  Lord  hath 
blessed"  —  so  redolent  of  the  soil  and  of  the 
hardiness  and  plentitude  of  rural  things  is 
the  influence  that  emanates  from  him.     His 
works  are  as  the  raiment  of  the  man,  and  to 
them  adheres  something  as  racy  and  whole- 
some as  is  yielded  by  the  life-giving,  fertile 
soil. 

We  are  prone  to  associate  the  names  of  our 
three  most  prominent  literary  naturalists: 
Gilbert  White  of  England  and  Thoreau  and 
John  Burroughs  of  America,  —  men  who 
have  been  so  en  rapport  with  nature  that, 


M374059 


4         The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

while  ostensibly  only  disclosing  the  charms 
of  their  adorable  mistress,  they  have  at  the 
same  time  subtly  communicated  much  of  their 
own  wide  knowledge  of  nature,  and  have  per- 
manently enriched  our  literature  as  well. 

In  thinking  of  Gilbert  White  one  invari- 
ably thinks  also  of  Selborne,  his  open-air 
parish;  in  thinking  of  Thoreau  one  as  natur- 
ally recalls  his  humble  shelter  on  the  banks  of 
Walden  Pond;  and  it  is  coming  to  pass  that 
in  thinking  of  John  Burroughs  one  thinks 
likewise  of  his  hidden  farm  high  on  the 
wooded  hills  that  overlook  the  Hudson, 
nearly  opposite  to  Poughkeepsie.  It  is  there 
that  he  has  built  himself  a  picturesque  re- 
treat, a  rustic  house  named  Slabsides.  I  find 
that  to  many  persons  the  word  Slabsides  gives 
the  impression  of  a  dilapidated,  ramshackle 
kind  of  a  place.  This  impression  is  an  incor- 
rect one.  The  cabin  is  a  well-built  two-story 
structure,  its  uneuphonious  but  fitting  name 
having  been  given  it  because  its  outer  walls  are 
formed  of  bark-covered  slabs.  "  My  friends 
frequently  complain,"  said  Mr.  Burroughs  to 
a  recent  visitor,  "because  I  have  not  given 
my  house  a  prettier  name,  but  this  name  just 
expresses  the  place,  and  the  place  just  meets 
the  want  that  I  felt  for  something  simple, 
homely,  secluded,  —  in  fact,  something  with 
the  bark  on." 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist        5 

Both  Gilbert  White  and  Thoreau  became 
identified  with  their  respective  environments 
almost  to  the  exclusion  of  other  fields.  The 
minute  observations  of  White,  and  his  records 
of  them,  extending  over  forty  years,  were 
almost  entirely  confined  to  the  district  of  Sel- 
borne.  He  tells  us  that  he  finds  "  that  that 
district  produces  the  greatest  variety  which  is 
the  most  examined."  The  thoroughness  with 
which  he  examined  his  own  locality  is  attested 
by  his  u  Natural  History  of  Selborne,"  a  book 
which  has  lived  more  than  a  hundred  years 
albeit  we  are  at  a  loss  to  comprehend  the 
secret  of  its  longevity.  Thoreau  was  such  a 
stay-at-home  that  he  refused  to  go  to  Paris 
lest  he  miss  something  of  interest  in  Con- 
cord. "I  have  traveled  a  good  deal  —  in 
Concord,"  he  says  in  his  droll  way.  And 
one  of  the  most  delicious  instances  of  provin- 
ciality, if  one  may  so  call  it,  that  I  ever  came 
across  is  that  of  Thoreau's  returning  Dr. 
Kane's  "Arctic  Voyages  "  to  a  friend  who  had 
lent  him  the  book,  with  the  remark  that 
u  Most  of  the  phenomena  therein  recorded 
are  to  be  observed  about  Concord."  In 
thinking  of  John  Burroughs,  however,  the 
thought  of  the  author's  mountain  home  as  the 
material  and  heart  of  his  books  does  not  come 
so  readily  to  consciousness.  For  most  of  us 


6         The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

who  have  felt  the  charm  of  his  lyrical  prose 
both  in  his  outdoor  books  and  in  his  u  Indoor 
Studies  "  were  familiar  with  him  as  an  author 
long  before  we  knew  there  was  a  Slabsides: 
long  before  there  was  one,  in  fact,  since  Mr. 
Burroughs  has  been  leading  his  readers  to 
nature  near  forty  years,  while  the  picturesque 
refuge  we  are  now  coming  to  associate  with 
him  has  been  in  existence  only  about  nine 
years. 

John  Burroughs,  our  poet-naturalist, 
seems  to  have  appropriated  all  out-of-doors 
for  his  stamping  ground.  He  had  given  us  in 
his  unaffected  limpid  prose  intimate  glimpses 
of  the  hills  and  streams  and  pastoral  farms 
of  his  native  country;  he  has  taken  us  down 
the  Pepacton,  the  stream  of  his  boyhood;  we 
have  traversed  with  him  the  "  Heart  of  the 
Southern  Catskills,"  and  the  valleys  of  the 
Neversink  and  of  the  Beaverkill ;  we  have  sat 
on  the  banks  of  the  Potomac  and  sailed  down 
the  Saguenay;  we  have  had  a  glimpse  of  the 
Blue  Grass  region  and  "A  Taste  of  Maine 
Birch"  (true,  Thoreau  gave  us  this,  too,  and 
other  "Excursions"  as  well);  we  have 
walked  with  him  the  lanes  of  "  Mellow  Eng- 
land " ;  journeyed  "  In  the  Carlyle  Country  " ; 
and  gazed  at  the  azure  glaciers  of  Alaska; 
and  doubtless  shall,  in  time,  when  they  have 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist        7 

sunk  in  far  enough,  hear  from  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs about  his  recent  wanderings  in  Florida 
and  Jamaica,  and  his  still  more  recent  adven- 
tures in  the  Yellowstone. 

John  Burroughs  is  thus  seen  not  to  be  un- 
traveled,  yet  he  is  no  wanderer.  No  man 
ever  had  the  home  feeling  stronger  than  has 
he;  none  is  more  completely  under  the  spell 
of  a  dear  and  familiar  locality,  as  all  his 
essays  testify.  Somewhere  he  has  said: 
"  Let  a  man  stick  his  staff  into  the  ground  any- 
where and  say,  'This  is  home/  and  describe 
things  from  that  point  of  view,  or  as  they 
stand  related  to  that  spot  —  the  weather,  the 
fauna,  the  flora  —  and  his  account  shall  have 
an  interest  to  us  it  could  not  have  if  not  thus 
located  and  defined." 

Before  hunting  out  Mr.  Burroughs  in  his 
mountain  hermitage,  let  us  glance  at  his  con- 
ventional abode,  "  Riverby,"  in  West  Park, 
Ulster  County,  New  York.  This  has  been 
his  home  for  more  than  twenty-five  years. 
Having  chosen  this  place  by  the  river,  he 
built  his  house  of  stone,  quarried  from  the 
neighboring  hills,  planted  a  vineyard  on  the 
sloping  hillside,  and  there  he  has  successfully 
combined  the  business  of  grape-culture  with 
his  pursuits  and  achievements  as  a  literary 
naturalist.  More  than  half  his  books  have 


8         The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

been  written  since  he  has  dwelt  at  Riverby  — 
the  earlier  ones  having  been  written  when  he 
was  a  clerk  in  the  treasury  department  in 
Washington  —  in  an  atmosphere  supposedly 
unfriendly  to  literary  work.  It  was  not, 
however,  until  he  gave  up  his  work  in  Wash- 
ington, and  his  later  position  as  a  bank  ex- 
aminer in  the  eastern  part  of  New  York  State, 
that  he  seemed  to  come  into  his  own.  Busi- 
ness life  he  had  long  known  could  never  be 
congenial  to  him,  literary  pursuits  alone  were 
likewise  insufficient;  the  long  line  of  yeoman 
ancestry  back  of  him  cried  out  for  recogni- 
tion. He  felt  the  need  of  closer  contact  with 
the  soil,  of  having  land  to  till  and  cultivate. 
This  need,  an  ancestral  one,  was  as  impera- 
tive as  his  need  of  literary  expression,  an  in- 
dividual one.  Hear  what  he  says  after  hav- 
ing plowed  in  his  new  vineyard  for  the  first 
time :  "  How  I  soaked  up  the  sunshine  today ! 
At  night  I  glowed  all  over;  my  whole  being 
had  had  an  earth  bath;  such  a  feeling  of 
freshly-plowed  land  in  every  cell  of  my  brain. 
The  furrow  had  struck  in;  the  sunshine  had 
photographed  it  upon  my  soul."  Later  Mr. 
Burroughs  built  him  a  little  study  somewhat 
apart  from  his  dwelling,  to  which  he  could 
retire  and  muse  and  write  whenever  the  mood 
impelled  him.  This  little  one-room  study, 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist        g 

covered  with  chestnut  bark,  is  on  the  brow  of 
a  hill  which  slopes  to  the  river;  it  commands 
an  extended  view  of  the  Hudson.  But  even 
this  did  not  meet  his  requirements.  The 
formality  and  routine  of  conventional  life 
palled  on  him;  the  expanse  of  the  Hudson, 
the  noise  of  railway  and  steamboat  wearied 
him ;  he  craved  something  more  retired,  more 
primitive,  more  homely.  "  You  cannot  have 
the  same  kind  of  attachment  and  sympathy 
with  a  great  river;  it  does  not  flow  through 
your  affections  like  a  lesser  stream,"  he  says, 
thinking,  no  doubt,  of  the  trout  brooks  that 
thread  his  father's  farm,  of  Montgomery 
Hollow  Stream,  of  the  Red  Kill,  and  of 
others  that  his  boyhood  knew.  Accordingly 
he  cast  about  for  some  sequestered  spot  in 
which  to  make  himself  a  sort  of  hermitage. 

For  several  years  previous  to  building  his 
woodland  retreat,  during  his  excursions  in 
the  vicinity  of  West  Park,  Mr.  Burroughs 
had  lingered  oftenest  in  these  hills  back  of 
the  Hudson  and  parallel  with  it,  where  he 
now  makes  his  summer  home.  He  had  fished 
and  rowed  in  Black  Pond,  sat  by  its  falls  in 
the  primitive  forest,  sometimes  with  a  book, 
sometimes  with  his  son,  or  with  some  other 
hunter  and  fisher  of  congenial  tastes,  and  on 
one  memorable  day  in  April,  years  agone, 


io       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

he  had  tarried  there  with  Walt  Whitman. 
There,  seated  on  a  fallen  tree,  Whitman 
wrote  this  description  of  the  place  which  was 
later  printed  in  "  Specimen  Days  " :  "I  jot 
this  memorandum  in  a  wild  scene  of  woods 
and  hills  where  we  have  come  to  visit  a  water- 
fall. I  never  saw  finer  or  more  copious  hem- 
locks, many  of  them  large,  some  old  and 
hoary.  Such  a  sentiment  to  them,  secretive, 
shaggy,  what  I  call  weather-beaten  and  let- 
alone  —  a  rich  underlay  of  ferns,  yew  sprouts, 
and  mosses,  beginning  to  be  spotted  with  the 
early  summer  wild  flowers.  Enveloping  all, 
the  monotone  and  liquid  gurgle  from  the 
hoarse,  impetuous,  copious  fall  —  the  green- 
ish-tawny, darkly  transparent  waters  plung- 
ing with  velocity  down  the  rocks,  with  patches 
of  milk-white  foam  —  a  stream  of  hurrying 
amber,  thirty  feet  wide,  risen  far  back  in  the 
hills  and  woods,  now  rushing  with  volume  — 
every  hundred  rods  a  fall,  and  sometimes 
three  or  four  in  that  distance.  A  primitive 
forest,  druidical,  solitary,  and  savage  —  not 
ten  visitors  a  year  —  broken  rocks  every- 
where, shade  overhead,  thick  under  foot  with 
leaves  —  a  just  palpable  wild  and  delicate 


aroma." 


"Not   ten   visitors   a   year"  —  that   may 
have  been  true  when  Whitman  described  the 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist       1 1 

place,  but  we  know  it  is  different  now. 
Troops  of  Vassar  girls  come  to  visit  the  her- 
mit of  Slabsides,  and  are  taken  to  these  f  ajls ; 
nature  lovers,  and  those  who  only  think  them- 
selves nature  lovers,  come  from  far  and  near ; 
Burroughs  clubs,  boys'  schools,  girls'  schools, 
pedestrians,  cyclists,  artists,  authors,  report- 
ers, poets,  —  young  and  old,  renowned  and 
obscure,  —  from  April  till  November  seek 
out  this  lover  of  nature,  who  is  a  lover  of 
human  nature  as  well,  who  gives  himself  and 
his  time  generously  to  those  who  find  him. 
When  the  friends  of  Socrates  asked  him 
where  they  should  bury  him  he  said:  "You 
may  bury  me  if  you  can  find  me."  Not  all 
who  seek  John  Burroughs  really  find  him; 
he  is  not  one  that  mixes  well  with  every  new- 
comer; a  person  must  either  have  something 
of  Mr.  Burroughs'  own  cast  of  mind,  or  else 
must  be  of  a  temperament  that  is  capable  of 
genuine  sympathy  with  him,  in  order  to  find 
the  real  man.  He  withdraws  into  his  shell 
before  persons  of  uncongenial  temperaments; 
to  such  he  can  never  really  speak  —  they  see 
Slabsides,  but  they  don't  see  Burroughs.  Mr. 
Burroughs  is,  however,  never  curt  nor  dis- 
courteous to  any  one.  Unlike  Thoreau,  who 
"  put  the  whole  of  nature  between  himself 
and  his  fellows,"  Mr.  Burroughs  leads  his 


12       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

fellows  to  nature,  although  it  is  sometimes, 
doubtless,  with  the  feeling  that  one  can  lead 
a  horse  to  water  but  can't  make  him  drink, 
for  of  all  the  sightseers  that  journey  to  Slab- 
sides  there  must  of  necessity  be  many  that 
Oh  and  Ah  a  good  deal,  but  never  really  get 
any  farther  in  their  study  of  nature  than  that. 
Still  it  can  scarcely  fail  to  be  salutary  even  to 
these,  to  get  away  from  the  noise  and  the 
strife  of  everyday  life  in  city  and  town,  and 
see  how  sane,  simple,  and  wholesome  life  is 
when  it  is  lived  in  a  sane  and  simple  and 
wholesome  way.  Somehow  it  helps  one  to 
get  a  clearer  sense  of  the  relative  value  of 
things;  it  makes  one  ashamed  of  his  petty 
potterings  over  trifles  to  witness  this  exempli- 
fication of  the  plain  living  and  high  thinking 
which  so  many  preach  about  and  so  few 
practice. 

"The  thing  which  a  man's  nature  calls 
him  to  do  —  what  else  so  well  worth  doing?  " 
asks  this  writer.  The  first  thing  that  im- 
presses one  after  glancing  around  this  well- 
built  cabin,  with  the  necessities  of  body  and 
soul  close  at  hand,  is  a  sort  of  vicarious  satis- 
faction that  here,  at  least,  is  one  man  who  has 
known  what  he  wanted  to  do  and  has  done  it. 
We  are  glad  that  Gilbert  White  made  pas- 
toral calls  on  his  outdoor  parishioners,  the 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist       13 

birds,  the  toads,  the  turtles,  the  snails,  and 
the  earth-worms,  although  we  often  wonder 
if  he  evinced  a  like  conscientiousness  toward 
his  human  parishioners;  we  are  glad  that 
Thoreau  left  the  manufacture  of  lead  pencils 
to  become,  as  Emerson  jocosely  complained, 
"the  leader  of  a  huckleberry  party,"  —  glad, 
because  these  were  the  things  their  na- 
tures called  them  to  do,  and  in  so  doing 
they  best  suited  themselves  and  enriched  their 
fellows,  —  they  literally  went  away  that  they 
might  come  again  to  us  in  a  closer,  truer  way 
than  had  they  tarried  in  our  midst.  It  must 
have  been  in  answer  to  a  similar  imperative 
need  of  his  own  that  John  Burroughs  in  his 
later  years  has  chosen  to  hie  himself  to  the 
secluded  yet  accessible  spot  where  his  moun- 
tain cabin  is  built. 

"As  the  bird  feathers  her  nest  with  down 
plucked  from  her  own  breast,"  says  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs in  one  of  his  early  essays,  "  so  one's 
spirit  must  shed  itself  upon  its  environment 
before  it  can  brood  and  be  at  all  content." 
Here  at  Slabsides  one  feels  that  its  master 
does  brood  and  is  content.  It  is  an  ideal  loca- 
tion for  a  man  of  his  temperament;  it  affords 
him  the  peace  and  seclusion  he  so  much  de- 
sires, yet  is  not  so  far  away  that  he  is  shut  off 
from  human  fellowship ;  for  he  is  no  recluse ; 


14       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

his  human  sympathies  are  broad  and  deep; 
unlike  Thoreau,  who  asserts  that  it  is  "  a  law 
that  you  cannot  have  a  deep  sympathy  with 
both  man  and  nature,"  and  that  "  those  quali- 
ties that  bring  you  near  to  the  one  estrange 
you  from  the  other,"  Mr.  Burroughs  likes  his 
kind;  he  is  the  most  accessible,  I  believe,  of 
any  notable  American  writer  —  a  fact  which 
is  perhaps  a  drawback  to  him  in  his  literary 
work,  his  submission  to  being  hunted  out, 
often  being  taken  advantage  of,  no  doubt,  by 
persons  who  are  in  no  real  sense  nature  lovers, 
but  who  go  to  his  retreat  merely  to  see  the 
gentle  hermit  in  hiding  there. 

After  twelve  years  acquaintance  with  his 
books  I  yielded  to  the  impulse,  often  felt  be- 
fore, to  write  to  Mr.  Burroughs  and  tell  him 
what  a  joy  his  books  had  been  to  me.  In 
answering  my  letter  he  had  said:  i;The 
genuine  responses  that  come  to  an  author 
from  his. unknown  readers,  judging  from  my 
own  experience,  are  always  very  welcome.  It 
is  no  intrusion  but  rather  an  inspiration."  A 
gracious  invitation  to  make  him  a  visit  came 
to  me  later. 

The  visit  was  made  in  September.  In  less 
than  two  hours  after  setting  out  I  arrived  at 
West  Park,  the  little  station  on  the  West 
Shore  Railroad,  where  I  found  Mr.  Bur- 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist       15 

roughs  in  waiting.  The  day  was  gray  and 
somewhat  forbidding,  not  so  the  author's 
greeting;  his  almost  instant  recognition  and 
his  quiet  welcome  made  me  feel  that  I  had 
always  known  him.  The  feeling  of  comrade- 
ship that  I  had  experienced  in  reading  his 
books  was  realized  in  his  presence.  With 
market-basket  on  arm  he  started  off  at  a 
brisk  pace  along  the  country  road,  first  look- 
ing to  see  if  1  was  well  shod,  then  warn- 
ing me  that  it  was  quite  a  climb  to  Slabsides. 
His  kindly  face,  framed  with  snowy  hair,  was 
familiar  to  me,  having  seen  many  pictures  of 
him.  He  was  dressed  in  olive-brown  clothes, 
"his  old  experienced  coat"  blending  in  color 
with  the  tree-trunks  and  the  soil  with  which 
one  felt  sure  it  had  often  been  in  close  com- 
munion. 

We  soon  left  the  country  road  and  struck 
into  a  woodland  path,  going  up  through 
quiet,  cathedral-like  woods  till  we  came  to  an 
abrupt  rocky  stairway  which  my  companion 
climbed  with  ease  and  agility  despite  his  five 
and  sixty  years. 

I  paused  to  examine  some  mushrooms,  and 
finding  a  species  that  I  knew  to  be  edible,  be- 
gan nibbling  it.  "  Don't  taste  that,"  he  said 
imperatively,  but  I  laughed  and  nibbled  away. 
With  a  mingling  of  anxiety  and  curiosity  he 


16       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

inquired:  "Are  you  sure  it's  all  right?  Do 
you  really  like  them?  I  never  could,  I'm 
sure;  they  are  so  uncanny  —  the  gnomes  or 
evil  genii,  or  hobgoblins  of  the  vegetable 
world  —  /  give  them  a  wide  berth." 

He  pointed  to  a  rock  in  the  distance  where 
he  said  he  sometimes  sat  and  sulked.  "  You 
sulk,  and  own  up  to  it,  too?  "  I  asked.  "  Yes, 
and  own  up  to  it,  too.  Why  not?  Don't 
you?" 

"Are  there  any  bee-trees  around  here?" 
I  ask,  for  I  remember  that  in  one  of  his  es- 
says he  has  said:  "If  you  would  know  the 
delights  of  bee  hunting  and  how  many  sweets 
such  a  trip  yields  besides  honey,  come  with 
me  some  bright,  warm,  late  September  or 
early  October  day.  It  is  the  golden  season  of 
the  year,  and  any  errand  or  pursuit  that  takes 
us  abroad  upon  the  hills  or  by  the  painted 
woods  and  along  the  amber-colored  streams 
at  such  a  time  is  enough."  Had  I  not  read 
this  invitation  time  and  again  and  appropri- 
ated it  to  myself?  Here  was  a  September 
day,  if  not  a  bright  one,  and  here  were  the 
painted  woods,  and  somehow  I  felt  almost 
aggrieved  that  he  did  not  immediately  pro- 
pose going  in  quest  of  wild  honey.  Instead 
he  only  replied:  "I  don't  know  whether 
there  are  bee-trees  around  here  now  or  not. 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist       17 

I  used  to  find  a  good  deal  of  wild  honey  over 
at  a  place  that  I  spoke  of  casually  as  Mount 
Hymettus,  and  was  much  surprised  later  to 
find  they  have  so  put  it  down  on  the  newer 
maps  of  this  region.  Wild  honey  is  delect- 
able, but  I  pursued  that  subject  till  I  sucked 
it  dry.  I  haven't  done  much  about  it  these 
later  years."  So  we  are  not  to  gather  wild 
honey,  I  find,  but  what  of  that,  am  I  not 
actually  walking  in  the  woods  with  John  Bur- 
roughs ? 

Up,  up,  we  climb,  an  ascent  of  about  a  mile 
and  a  quarter  from  the  railway  station. 
Emerging  from  the  woods  we  come  rather 
suddenly  upon  a  reclaimed  rock-girt  swamp, 
the  most  of  which  is  marked  off  in  long  green 
lines  of  celery.  This  swamp  was  formerly  a 
lake  bottom;  its  rich  black  soil,  and  three 
perennial  springs  near  by,  made  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs decide  to  drain  and  reclaim  the  soil 
and  compel  it  to  yield  celery,  lettuce,  and 
other  exceptionally  fine  garden  produce. 

Nestling  under  gray  rocks,  on  the  edge  of 
the  celery  garden,  empowered  in  forest  trees, 
is  the  vine-covered  cabin  Slabsides. 

What  a  feeling  of  peace  and  aloofness 
comes  over  one  as  he  looks  up  at  the  rocky 
encircling  hills!  The  few  cabins  scattered 
about  on  other  rocks  are  at  a  just  comfortable 


1 8       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

distance  to  be  neighborly,  but  not  too  neigh- 
borly. Would  one  be  lonesome  here?  Aye, 
lonesome,  but 

"  Not  melancholy,  —  no,  for  it  is  green 
And  bright  and  fertile,  furnished  in  itself 
With  the  few  needful  things  that  life  requires; 
In  rugged  arms  how  soft  it  seems  to  lie, 
How  tenderly  protected !  " 

Mr.  Burroughs  has  given  to  those  who 
contemplate  building  a  house  some  sound  ad- 
vice in  his  essay  "The  Roof  Tree."  There 
he  has  said  that  a  man  makes  public  procla- 
mation of  what  are  his  tastes  and  his  manners, 
or  his  want  of  them,  when  he  builds  his  house. 
He  has  also  said  that  if  we  can  only  keep  our 
pride  and  vanity  in  abeyance  and  forget  that 
all  the  world  is  looking  on,  we  may  be  reason- 
ably sure  of  having  beautiful  houses.  Tried 
by  his  own  test,  we  find  that  he  has  no  reason 
to  be  ashamed  of  his  tastes  nor  of  his  man- 
ners when  Slabsides  is  critically  examined. 
Blending  with  its  surroundings,  it  is  coarse, 
strong,  and  substantial  without;  within  it  is 
snug  and  comfortable ;  its  wide  door  bespeaks 
hospitality;  its  low,  broad  roof,  protection 
and  shelter;  its  capacious  hearth,  cheer;  all 
its  appointments  for  the  bodily  needs  bespeak 
simplicity  and  frugality;  and  its  books  and 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist       19 

pictures,  and  the  conversation  of  the  host  — 
are  they  not  there  for  the  needs  that  bread 
alone  will  not  supply? 

"  Mr.  Burroughs,  why  don't  you  paint 
things?  "  asked  a  little  boy  of  four  who  had 
been  spending  a  happy  day  at  Slabsides,  but 
who,  at  nightfall,  while  nestling  in  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs's  arms,  seemed  suddenly  to  realize  that 
this  rustic  home  is  very  different  from  any- 
thing he  had  seen  before.  "  I  don't  like 
things  painted,  my  little  man ;  that  is  just  why 
I  came  up  here  —  to  get  away  from  paint  and 
polish  —  just  as  you  liked  to  have  on  your 
overalls  today  and  play  on  the  grass,  instead 
of  keeping  on  that  pretty  blue  dress  your 
mamma  wanted  you  to  keep  clean."  "  Oh  1  " 
said  the  child  in  a  knowing  tone,  and  one  felt 
that  he  understood.  But  that  is  another 
story. 

The  time  of  which  I  am  speaking,  that  gray 
September  day  —  what  a  memorable  day  it 
was !  How  cheery  the  large,  low  room  looked 
when  Mr.  Burroughs  replenished  the  smold- 
ering fire!  "  I  sometimes  come  up  here  even 
in  winter,  build  a  fire  and  stay  for  an  hour  or 
more,  with  long,  sad,  sweet  thoughts  and 
musings,"  he  said.  He  is  justly  proud  of  the 
huge  stone  fireplace  and  chimney  which  he 
helped  to  construct  himself;  he  also  helped 


20       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

to  hew  the  trees  and  build  the  house.  "  What 
joy  went  into  the  building  of  this  retreat!  I 
never  expect  to  be  so  well  content  again." 
Then  musing,  he  added:  "It  is  a  comfort- 
able, indolent  life  I  lead  here;  I  read  a  little, 
write  a  little,  and  dream  a  good  deal.  Here 
the  sun  does  not  rise  so  early  as  it  does  down 
at  Riverby.  '  Tired  nature's  sweet  restorer ' 
is  not  put  to  rout  so  soon  by  the  screaming 
whistles,  the  thundering  trains,  and  the  neces- 
sary rules  and  regulations  of  well-ordered 
domestic  machinery.  Here  I  really  *  loaf  and 
invite  my  soul.'  Yes,  I  am  often  very  melan- 
choly and  hungry  for  companionship  —  not 
in  the  summer  months,  no,  but  in  the  quiet 
evenings  before  the  fire,  with  only  Silly  Sally 
to  share  my  long  long  thoughts;  she  is  very 
attentive,  but  I  doubt  if  she  notices  when  I 
sigh.  She  doesn't  even  heed  me  when  I  tell 
her  that  ornithology  is  a  first-rate  pursuit  for 
men,  but  a  bad  one  for  cats.  I  suspect  that 
she  studies  the  birds  with  even  greater  care 
than  I  do,  for  now  I  can  get  all  I  want  of  a 
bird  and  let  him  remain  in  the  bush,  but  Silly 
Sally  is  a  thorough-going  ornithologist;  she 
must  engage  in  all  the  feather  splittings  that 
the  ornithologists  do,  and  she  isn't  satisfied 
until  she  has  thoroughly  dissected  and  di- 
gested her  material,  and  has  all  the  dry  bones 
of  the  subject  laid  bare." 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist      21 

We  sat  before  the  fire  while  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs talked  of  nature,  of  books,  of  men 
and  women  whose  lives  or  books,  or  both, 
have  closely  touched  his  own  —  chiefly  of 
Emerson  and  of  Whitman  he  talked,  the  men 
to  whom  he  seems  to  owe  the  most,  the  two 
whom  most  his  soul  has  loved. 

He  told  of  his  first  bite  into  Emerson  —  it 
was  like  tasting  a  green  apple  —  not  that 
Emerson  was  unripe,  but  that  Burroughs 
wasn't  ripe  for  him.  A  year  or  two  later  he 
tasted  again.  "  *  Why,  this  tastes  good,'  I 
said,  and  took  a  bigger  bite."  Then  he  pro- 
ceeded to  devour  everything  of  Emerson's 
that  he  could  find.  "  I  was  dominated  by 
him.  I  unconsciously  imitated  his  style.  I 
was  Jonah  in  the  whale's  belly  —  the  great 
fish  swallowed  me.  As  soon  as  I  began  to 
realize  this,  I  said  to  myself,  '  See  here,  this 
will  never  do,  I  must  be  myself  —  not  a 
feeble  imitation  of  any  one,  not  even  of  Emer- 
son.' '  It  was  then  that  he  began  to  write 
on  outdoor  themes  to  see,  he  said,  if  he  could 
get  the  Emersonian  musk  out  of  his  gar- 
ments. He  buried  his  garments  in  the  earth, 
as  it  were,  that  the  earth  might  draw  out  this 
rank  suggestion  of  Emerson.  The  "  Emer- 
sonian musk"  must  have  been  pretty  strong 
in  his  early  essays,  notably  in  one  called  u  Ex- 


22       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

pression,"  which  was  published  anonymously 
in  The  Atlantic  Monthly  in  1860.  Poole's 
Index  attributed  this  essay  to  Emerson,  and 
even  as  acute  a  critic  as  Professor  Hill  of 
Harvard  has  done  the  same  —  the  latest  edi- 
tion of  Hill's  Rhetoric,  I  find,  continues  to 
quote  from  this  essay  by  Mr.  Burroughs, 
crediting  it  to  Emerson.  Within  the  past 
year,  however,  Professor  Hill  has  been  in- 
formed of  this  error,  and  says  it  shall  be  cor- 
rected in  later  editions. 

As  soon  as  Mr.  Burroughs  began  to  write 
on  outdoor  themes,  on  things  dear  and  famil- 
iar to  him,  he  found  that  he  had  some  things 
of  his  own  to  say,  and,  to  his  great  surprise, 
he  found  that  readers  liked  to  hear  him  say 
them  in  his  own  way. 

"  I  remember  the  first  time  I  saw  Emerson," 
he  continued,  musingly;  "it  was  at  West  Point 
during  the  June  examination  of  the  cadets. 
Emerson  had  been  appointed  by  President 
Lincoln  as  one  of  the  board  of  visitors.  I  had 
been  around  there  in  the  afternoon  and  had 
been  peculiarly  interested  in  one  man  whose 
striking  face  and  manner  kept  challenging  my 
attention.  I  did  not  hear  him  speak,  but  saw 
him  going  about  with  a  silk  hat,  much  too 
large,  pushed  back  on  his  head;  his  sharp  eyes 
peering  into  everything  —  curious  about 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist      23 

everything.  '  Here,'  said  I  to  myself,  *  is  a 
countryman  who  has  got  away  from  home, 
and  who  intends  to  see  all  that  is  going  on.' 
Such  an  alert,  interested  air !  That  evening  a 
friend  came  to  me,  and  in  a  voice  full  of  awe 
and  enthusiasm  said,  '  Emerson  is  in  town ! ' 
Then  I  knew  who  the  alert,  sharp-eyed 
stranger  was.  That  evening  we  went  to  the 
meeting  and  met  our  hero,  and  the  next  day 
we  walked  and  talked  with  him.  He  seemed 
glad  to  get  away  from  those  old  fogies  and 
chat  with  us  younger  men.  I  remember  carry- 
ing his  valise  to  the  boat  landing  —  I  was  in 
the  seventh  heaven  of  delight. 

"  I  saw  him  several  years  later,"  he  con- 
tinued, "  soon  after  *  Wake  Robin  '  was  pub- 
lished; he  mentioned  it  and  said:  *  Capital 
title,  capital ! '  I  don't  suppose  he  had  read 
much  besides  the  title. 

;t  The  last  time  I  saw  him,"  he  said  with  a 
sigh,  "  was  at  Holmes'  seventieth  birthday 
breakfast,  in  Boston.  But  then  his  mind  was 
like  a  splendid  bridge  with  one  span  missing; 
he  had  —  what  is  it  you  doctors  call  it?  — 
aphasia,  yes,  that  is  it  —  he  had  to  grope  so 
for  his  words.  But  what  a  serene,  god-like 
air !  He  was  like  a  plucked  eagle  tarrying  in 
the  midst  of  a  lot  of  lesser  birds.  He  would 
sweep  the  assembly  with  that  searching  glance 


24       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

as  much  as  to  say :  '  What  is  all  this  buzzing 
and  chirping  about?'  Holmes  was  as  bril- 
liant and  scintillating  as  ever  —  sparks  of  wit 
would  greet  every  newcomer,  flying  out  just 
as  the  sparks  fly  from  that  log  there.  Whit- 
tier  was  there,  too,  looking  nervous  and  un- 
happy, and  as  if  very  much  out  of  his  element. 
But  he  stood  next  to  Emerson,  prompting  his 
memory  and  supplying  the  words  his  voice  re- 
fused to  utter.  When  I  was  presented,  Emer- 
son said  in  a  slow,  questioning  way :  '  Bur- 
roughs —  Burroughs  ?  '  '  Why,  thee  knows 
him/  said  Whittier,  jogging  his  memory  with 
some  further  explanation;  but  I  doubt  if  he 
then  remembered  anything  about  me." 

It  was  not  such  a  leap  from  the  New  Eng- 
land writers  to  Whitman  as  one  might  im- 
agine. Mr.  Burroughs  spoke  of  Emerson's 
prompt  and  generous  indorsement  of  the  first 
edition  of  "  Leaves  of  Grass  "  :  "I  give  you 
joy  of  your  free  brave  thought.  I  have  great 
joy  in  it."  This,  and  much  else,  Emerson 
had  written  in  a  letter  to  Whitman.  The 
latter  had  shown  the  letter  to  Dana,  who  had 
said:  "It  is  the  charter  of  an  Emperor!" 
Whitman's  head  was  undoubtedly  a  little 
turned  by  praise  from  such  a  source,  and  he 
did  what  he  should  not  have  done  without 
first  obtaining  permission,  he  published  Em- 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist      2$ 

erson's  letter  in  his  next  edition  of  the  Leaves. 
This  disturbed  Emerson,  but  in  spite  of  all 
that  has  been  said  on  the  subject,  Emerson 
and  Whitman  remained  firm  friends  to  the 
last. 

"Whitman  was  a  child  of  the  sea,"  said 
Mr.  Burroughs,  "  nurtured  by  the  sea,  cradled 
by  the  sea ;  he  gave  one  the  same  sense  of  in- 
vigoration  and  of  illimitableness  that  we  get 
from  the  '  husky-voiced  sea.'  He  never 
looked  so  much  at  home  as  when  on  the 
shore  —  his  gray  clothes,  gray  hair,  and  far- 
seeing  blue-gray  eyes,  blending  with  the  sur- 
roundings. And  his  thoughts  —  the  same 
broad  sweep,  the  elemental  force  and  gran- 
deur, and  all-embracingness  of  the  impartial 
sea! 

"Whitman  never  hurried,"  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs continued,  "  he  always  seemed  to  have 
infinite  time  at  his  disposal.  He  often  used 
to  take  Sunday  breakfasts  with  us  in  Wash- 
ington, but  he  was  always  late.  I  don't  know 
that  he  was  ever  known  to  get  there  on  time ; 
but  when  he  did  come  it  was  with  such 
a  cheery,  fresh,  wholesome  air.  He  radiated 
health  and  good  humor.  This  is  what  made 
his  work  among  the  sick  soldiers  in  Wash- 
ington of  such  inestimable  value.  Every  one 
that  came  into  personal  relations  with  him  felt 
his  rare  compelling  charm." 


26       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

It  was  all  very  well  this  talk  about  the 
poets,  but  climbing  "  break-neck  stairs "  on 
our  way  thither  had  given  the  guest  an  appe- 
tite and  the  host  as  well;  and  these  appetites 
had  to  be  appeased  by  something  less  tran- 
scendental than  a  feast  of  reason.  Mr.  Bur- 
roughs knew  this;  and,  scarcely  interrupting 
his  engaging  monologue,  went  about  his  prep- 
arations for  dinner,  doing  things  deftly  and 
quietly,  all  unconscious  that  there  was  any- 
thing peculiar  in  this  sight  to  a  spectator. 
And  such  a  dinner!  It  was  found  that  the 
host  can  not  only  write  charming  books,  and 
successfully  grow  grapes,  but  that  he  can  also 
cook  a  dinner  that  would  do  credit  to  an 
Adirondack  guide  —  and  when  one  has  said 
this,  what  more  need  one  say? 

"  If  all  dainty  fingers  their  duties  might  choose, 
Who   would   wash   up   the   dishes   and   polish   the 
shoes?"  — 

Silly  Sally,  the  "  fireside  Sphinx,"  not  offering 
her  services,  except  to  dispose  of  certain 
chicken  bones  in  her  own  way,  host  and  guest 
washed  and  wiped  the  dishes,  weighing 
Schopenhauer,  Amiel,  and  Maeterlinck  in  the 
balance  at  the  same  time. 

It  was  here  that  Mr.  Burroughs  told  his 
guest  about  Anne  Gilchrist,  the  talented, 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist      27 

noble-hearted  English  woman  whose  ready 
acceptance  and  splendid  enthusiasm  of  Whit- 
man's message  bore  fruit  in  her  penetrating 
criticism  of  Whitman  which  stands  today  un- 
rivaled by  anything  that  has  been  written  con- 
cerning the  Good  Gray  Poet. 

Like  most  of  Mr.  Burroughs'  readers  I 
am  very  fond  of  his  little  poem  "  Waiting," 
and,  like  most  of  them,  I  told  him  so,  on 
seeing  him  seated  before  his  fire  after  the 
work  was  done,  with  folded  hands  and  face 
serene,  —  a  living  embodiment  of  the  faith 
and  trust  expressed  in  those  familiar  verses. 
It  would  seem  natural  that  he  should  write 
such  a  poem  after  the  heat  of  the  day,  after 
his  ripe  experience,  after  success  has  come  to 
him,  —  it  is  the  lesson  we  expect  one  to  learn 
on  reaching  his  age,  and  learning  how  futile 
is  the  fret  and  urge  of  life,  how  infinitely 
better  is  the  attitude  of  trust  that  what  is  our 
own  will  gravitate  to  us  in  obedience  to 
eternal  laws  —  but  it  seemed  strange  to  learn 
that  this  poem  was  written  by  Mr.  Burroughs 
when  he  was  a  young  man,  life  all  before  him, 
his  prospects  in  rather  a  dubious  and  chaotic 
condition,  his  own  aspirations  then  seeming 
likely  to  come  to  naught  —  but  such,  he  told 
me,  was  the  case  when  "  Waiting "  found 
itself  on  paper. 


28       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

"  I  have  lived  to  prove  it  true,"  he  said,  — 
"  that  which  I  but  vaguely  felt  when  I  wrote 
the  lines.  Our  lives  are  all  so  fearfully  and 
wonderfully  shot  through  with  the  very  warp 
and  woof  of  the  universe,  past,  present,  and 
to  come!  No  doubt  at  all  that  our  own, — 
that  which  our  souls  crave  and  need,  does 
gravitate  toward  us,  or  we  toward  it. 
1  Waiting '  has  been  successful,"  he  added, 
"not  on  account  of  its  poetic  merit,  but  for 
some  other  merit  or  quality.  It  puts  in  simple 
and  happy  form  some  common  religious  as- 
pirations, without  using  the  religious  jargon. 
People  write  me  from  all  parts  of  the  country 
that  they  treasure  it  in  their  hearts;  that  it 
steadies  their  hand  at  the  helm ;  that  it  is  full 
of  consolation  for  them.  It  is  because  it  is 
poetry  alloyed  with  religion  that  it  has  this 
effect.  Poetry  alone  would  not  do  this; 
neither  would  a  prose  expression  of  the  same 
religious  aspirations  do  it,  for  we  often  out- 
grow the  religious  views  and  feelings  of  the 
past.  The  religious  thrill,  the  sense  of  the 
Infinite,  the  awe  and  majesty  of  the  universe, 
are  no  doubt  permanent  in  the  race,  but  all 
expressions  of  these  feelings  in  creeds  and 
forms  addressed  to  the  understanding,  or  ex- 
posed to  the  analysis  of  the  understanding, 
are  as  transient  and  flitting  as  the  leaves  of 


The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist      29 

the  trees.  My  little  poem  is  vague  enough  to 
escape  the  reason,  sincere  enough  to  go  to  the 
heart,  and  poetic  enough  to  stir  the  imagina- 
tion." 

The  power  of  accurate  observation,  of  dis- 
passionate analysis,  of  keen  discrimination 
and  insight  that  Mr.  Burroughs's  readers  are 
so  familiar  with  in  his  writings  about  nature, 
books,  men,  and  life  in  general,  is  here  seen 
to  extend  to  self-analysis  as  well  —  a  rare 
gift  —  a  power  that  makes  his  opinions  carry 
conviction,  because  the  reader  feels  that  the 
author  is  not  intent  on  upholding  any  theory, 
but  only  on  seeing  things  as  they  are  and  re- 
porting them  as  they  are. 

A  steady  rain  had  set  in  early  in  the  after- 
noon, effectually  drowning  my  hopes  of  a 
longer  woodland  walk  that  day,  but  I  was 
then,  and  many  a  time  since  then,  have  been 
well  content  that  it  was  so.  I  learned  less  of 
woodland  lore,  but  more  of  the  woodland 
philosopher. 

We  spoke  of  the  Harriman  Alaska  Expedi- 
tion in  1889,  of  which  Mr.  Burroughs  was  a 
guest.  He  seemed  rather  dissatisfied  with  his 
contribution  to  the  elegant  book  about  the 
expedition  that  was  subsequently  published. 
"A  thing  has  to  stay  in  my  consciousness  a 
while,"  he  explained,  "  and  grow  and  develop 


30       The  Retreat  of  a  Poet  Naturalist 

there  before  I  can  reproduce  it  on  paper.  If 
I  could  have  waited  six  months  or  more,  until 
I  felt  moved  to  write,  I  might  have  brought 
forth  something  more  creditable;  but  they 
made  me  go  about  it  deliberately,  before  I 
had  carried  it  long  enough,  before  I  had  made 
it  my  own.  That  is  not  my  way  of  writing  — 
I  go  to  Nature  for  love  of  her  and  the  book 
follows  or  not,  as  the  case  may  be." 

In  such  converse  passed  the  hours  of  a 
memorable  day  in  that  humble  retreat  on  the 
wooded  hills, 

"Away  from  the  clank  of  the  world," 

and  in  the  company  of  the  poet-naturalist, 
John  Burroughs.  So  cordial  had  my  host 
been,  so  gracious  the  admission  to  his  home 
and  hospitality,  that  I  left  the  little  refuge 
with  a  feeling  of  enrichment  I  shall  cherish 
while  life  lasts  —  I  had  sought  out  a  favorite 
author,  I  gained  a  friend. 


,/V 


RETURNTO: 


DEPARTMENT 


PAMPNLFF  BINDER 


GAYLORD  BROS.  IM. 

Syr.cu,.,  N.  Y. 

Stockton,  C.lif 


